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Writer's pictureTechnology in Education

Can a Chromebook be your daily driver?

We have been looking for a Chromebook teacher device ever since… ever!

Chromebooks for students have saved the budget so why not Chromebooks for staff? It seemed like a far stretch for teachers asking them to switch from their beloved MacBooks or Windows laptops to a Chromebook. Why would you give up a powerhouse machine and a retina display to work on a slow, laggy, pixelated screen that only runs Chrome OS? Read on to find out more…

Chromebooks have always been marketed as a tool for students and not so much for teachers. Well, we’re in 2019 and everything we use is practically cloud based and Google driven. At ICT EDU Magazine, we took a personal 2 week challenge to see if we could use a Chromebook as our daily driver. We also had a few teachers road test a Chromebook in their day to day teaching operations. Gather around, the results are in:

There were small drawbacks that teachers experienced when using the Chromebook:

  1. We had an issue with printing, however this could be easily overcome using a 3rd party software like PaperCut.

  2. Teachers wanting to use a particular font (Vic Modern Cursive) and not being able to be installed on the Chromebook.

  3. Particular software not working as it is only made for Windows and Mac, however using the Google Play Store we were able to find a tool that was similar (if not better).

The overall performance of the Chromebook was fast and snappy and met our requirements. We did however road test the brand new Acer Spin 13 which just dropped this year #latest #greatest.


So all in all, YES is the answer to the following question: Can the Chromebook be a teacher’s daily driver?

If you’re seriously thinking of moving your teachers over to a Chromebook to save the dollars then be tactful in how it is achieved. We had a few comments from teachers who weren’t fond of the idea, particularly having to learn a new way of doing things. Our recommendation is purchasing a higher end Chromebook which will set you back about $800-$900 dollars but will be worth it in the long run.

Manufacturers like Acer, HP and Lenovo have launched a few models that could definitely work as a teacher daily driver. Our requirements for teachers using Chromebooks are:

  1. Minimum 13” screen

  2. Screen must be full high definition

  3. Quality build

  4. Faster processor

Looking for a device for your staff? Here are some Chromebook devices currently available on the market:


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